Life After You
by KillerQueen201
Summary: Anna survives but loses all of her memories of her life before the fall. Mithos' plan begins to move forward and with it comes the Journey of Regeneration. What happens when Anna is faced with a man she feels like she should know? And why is he intent on ignoring her? - A Tales of Symphonia rewrite (with a decent amount of canon divergence for obvious reasons).


Re-posting from AO3!

Anna knew she was dying. She'd had many times in her (relatively) short life where she felt like she was going to die. Every damn day in the human ranch she figured would be her last. Every day she had worried that she'd finally pissed off the wrong desian and would be killed as punishment. Even once she'd escaped that Martel-forsaken place, she feared that she would be found, returned to the ranch, or just killed outright. Kratos tried to keep her safe, keep her mind off her fears, but sometimes they'd return, unbidden, to haunt her.

But now, Anna knew, THIS was what dying felt like. She'd known it was going to happen the moment Kvar had grabbed her, his rough hand around her throat. The fear of death only increased when he ripped the exsphere out of her left hand. Kratos, ever her guardian angel, tried to tell her it would all be okay. He tried to fight the desians, raining judgement down upon them all. But Kvar had brought an army.

She wished she had the strength to snort at that now, even if this crystal was oh so important, a whole army seemed a little like overkill. Then again, Kratos had managed to slaughter the entire aforementioned army. Maybe it wasn't overkill after all.

Kvar had disappeared though. Left the moment he'd unleashed the monster. He was a coward, Anna knew this. And yet, something just seemed so wrong about him unleashing her on her loving family and then leaving as if he hadn't just destroyed three lives.

At least, she reasoned, Kratos' got a hit on him before he disappeared.

Kratos hadn't been able to continue chasing after Kvar though, because the monster then tried to kill Lloyd.

Anna knew then that there wasn't another option. In a moment of clarity, she pleaded for Kratos to kill her, to save their son.

And he had. Cut her arm off. Stabbed her. Then the cliff crumbled underneath her body, sending her careening down to the forest below.

Her tumble down the cliff had made her hit her head, hard, and she was falling in and out of consciousness. Where her left arm should have been was a stump gushing crimson blood onto the dirt floor of the forest. Idly, she wondered if her blood would help the plants grow.

Lloyd was cradled against her body, clutched in her right arm, her only arm. His cries had stopped. Anna only knew he was alive because she could feel his shallow breath against her neck.

She felt her eyes close involuntarily again and when she opened them, a figure was walking toward her. She couldn't make them out but still felt her heart leap in her chest. Kratos had found them.

"Kra-tos," she croaked out. Anna's whole body was on fire, flames licking where her arm should have been. Every breath she could feel a sharp, stabbing pain in her lungs. Her head throbbed and a copper taste had flooded her mouth.

The figure rushed towards her and dropped to their knees. In the moment before her eyes closed again, Anna felt her heart give a painful clench. It wasn't Kratos that had found them.

The man was speaking to her, a low sound that sounded much too worried to be a desian. His voice was garbled, getting worse and more distorted as the pounding in her head increased.

Anna could feel her eyes closing again. Her body wanting to sleep even as her brain screamed for her to fight the fogginess that had overtaken her. She had to stay awake, had to protect her son. She had to find Kratos.

The last thought Anna had before the darkness overcame her, was that surely Kratos would find them soon. Surely he wouldn't begrudge her resting her eyes for a moment. He'd find them. Besides, Lloyd was okay. Even if she wasn't (she was dying after all), Kratos would take good care of their baby boy, even without her.


End file.
